DannyBoyinExile

By TDCJ policy, each prison in Texas will be placed on lockdown at least once per year, while they search the entire unit for contraband. In practice, most maximum security units do this twice a year, so they can get rid of serious contraband like weapons, drugs, and cell phones – temporarily, at least.
This is a tremendous nuisance for the inmates (the shakedown, I mean, not losing the contraband!), but it must be endured. It’s even worse in Ad-Seg because, due to the higher prevalence of contraband there, they must go through a shakedown every 90 days!
A virtual army of guards will start on one wing, and gradually search the whole unit. This tends to be a perfect time for inmates to “de-clutter”. There will literally be MOUNTAINS of trash on every run, as people toss out old newspapers, torn up magazines, previously read books and letters, miscellaneous paperwork and junk mail – not to mention the ever-present empty brown paper sacks from the sack meals we eat three times a day.
When it is your wing’s turn, you must pack up all of your property and carry it to the gym, where we are lined in rows, in front of lines of tables where guards are searching through inmate property – one person from each line at a time.
An inmate would have to be a fool to attempt to carry something through this situation – but, alas, there are plenty of fools here. Some people can’t help but try to make it through with their containers of glue, rolls of tape, tattoo guns, bottles of ink – or worse! – even though all of those items are easily replaceable once we return to our regular routines.
Beside each searching table is a huge trash drum, wherein the inmates generally have the option of agreeing to throw minor contraband items away, rather than having them formally confiscated – and a case written for it. Even so, I haven’t seen a shakedown yet, which didn’t result in numerous disciplinary cases written on inmates who easily (and smartly) could have avoided it. (Admittedly, ” smartly” is not an adjective that could correctly be used to describe most inmates in TDCJ.)
The number one thing most inmates dread about shakedowns is the “box test”. That’s where a box is provided, which approximately equals the size of an inmate’s locker – which is the official limit to how much property an inmate is allowed to have. ALL property must fit in said box – or some of it will be confiscated, though the inmate is generally allowed to choose which items to keep, and which to jettison. If there’s one thing inmates hate worse than losing the items they’re not supposed to have, it’s losing the items they ARE allowed to have, simply because they have too much of them.
For this reason, lockdowns are a prime opportunity for inmates to de-clutter, and toss out extra items that they are holding onto for no reason whatsoever – so they can make room for the items they value more. (If not for this, some inmates might NEVER throw away torn up books, magazines, or old newspapers that they hold onto for no reason whatsoever.)
Some inmates prefer to be among the first wings to be searched, so that they’ve gotten it over with, reorganized their cells, and lived pretty much normally (except for the sack meals) while waiting for the rest of the unit to be searched. And some inmates would rather be among the last, in hopes that the guards doing the searching will be in a hurry to rush through their searching and finish, so that the unit can go back to normal operations. I’ve had it both ways – and there’s really not much difference. I make it a point to search my OWN property beforehand, to locate (and discard) any contraband items I may have forgotten about, I get rid of excess junk I have no use for – and I take advantage of the extra free time to play on my tablet! It’s usually over with in under two weeks, at any rate. Like everything else in life, it’s all what you make it… So says DannyBoy.